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wednesday ◀
1.21.98
six.a ◀
daily kansan
Don't drink, don't smoke, what do you do?
The straightedge lifestyle is a stand against promiscuous sex and the use of drugs, including alcohol and nicotine. Straightedgers around the world often identify themselves by marking large black X's on their hands, like those put on underage people who enter bars.
"It just seems like drinking and smoking are more like diversions to steer you away from your internal self and from self-actualization. It's just like steering people away from looking inside themselves." Brian Macon chicago freshman
Straightedge students try to find refuge in the 'just do it' society
The year is 1981, the place is a live music club in New York City called CBGB's. A four-man band, calling themselves Minor Threat, comes out from backstage. The singer grasps the microphone, silently watching the crowd silently watch him. The drummer taps his sticks together four times.
story by ronnie wachter $ \textcircled{*} $ Illustration by travis m. millard
Ian Macaye begins screaming into the mike, which he now clenches.
I don't smoke! I don't drink! I don't f--t-
At least I can f--ing think!"
Minor Threat could not have known it at the time, but they were beginning a cultish, worldwide subculture known as "straightedge."
The straightedge lifestyle is a stand against promiscuous sex and the use of drugs, including alcohol and nicotine. To those who follow these beliefs, people known as "straightedgers," it is a method of self-improvement, and does not include
nor does it rule out - religion. It was rooted in the hardcore punk rock scene of 1980s New York, but was steadily expanded across the globe, including to the University of Kansas.
The year is 1997. Brian Macon, Chicago freshman, is one of the University's straightedge students.
"I had been into things like drinking ... and I smoked a little bit and I had experienced some pot, but I honestly woke up one day and said, 'I'm not doing this any more.'" he said.
Even though the University is listed as the No. 8 party school in the nation by The Princeton Review, students who refuse to have sex and use alcohol, tobacco or other drugs really are not all that hard to find.
Many people adopt a straight lifestyle as part of their religious beliefs; only a few because they identify with the straight-edge philosophy. They tend to see intoxicants and sexuality not as freedom or rebellion, but as a restraint. They see bars and house parties as uninteresting rather than entertaining.
"More people need to realize that by drinking and whatnot, it's not really rebelling." Macon said. "It's more or less conforming to what society's expectations are."
Straightedges around the world often identify themselves by marking large black X's on their hands, like those put on underage people who enter bars. Many of them identify with the punk rock scene as well. Macon, with his large eyebrow ring, and straightedge junior Jebon Carlson, who wears thick-rimmed glasses and sports a nearly-shaven head, do stand out in a crowd.
Other straightedgers blend into their surroundings, however. Kaitlin Giddings and Jeff Whittier, both Kansas City, Kan., freshmen and straightedgers, couldn't be picked out from the next student walking down Jayhawk Boulevard. Giddings often wears a white T-shirt and miniskirt, while Whittier prefers jeans and his Operation Ivy T-shirt.
"It just seems like drinking and smoking are more like diversions to steer you away from your internal self and from self-actualization." Macon said. "It's just like steering people away from looking inside themselves."
Many straightedgers are dissatisfied with the world around them, and believe that their lifestyle will help them find solutions to the problems they see.
"I was a mean drunk," Carlson said. "I watched my friends getting stoned, and I didn't like it."
"They're kind of boring." Jim Applehanz,
Topeka freshman and straightened, said
of non-straightenedgers. "The whole week-end involves standing in line to get beer, so they can work up enough courage to talk to a girl. Nothing ever happens."
"No one's got the courage to stand up and say 'Maybe this is wrong' or 'Maybe I should change,'" Macon said. "I try to sift through what they're thinking, and basically there there's no thought process there. It's like, whatever they're doing, if it doesn't affect them, it doesn't exist."
Besides wishing to heighten concern about the dangers of STDs, addictions, drunk driving and pregnancies, some straightedge people take up a variety of other causes, including vegetarianism, animal rights, environmentalism, politics — and atheism.
"I'm trying to better myself, and trying to come to conclusions and sort of sift everything out, and I think if I try to add religion to that, I would just get more confused." Macon said.
Of the non-straightedge students who are familiar with the scene, few seem to have a positive opinion of it.
"I think most of them are fake; most of the ones I run into," said Chris Miller, Topeka freshman. "If people are true with it, then it's cool, but it takes a lot to live like that."
Straightedgers feel that what they believe should not be an issue. "I say, 'I'm straightedge' and people go: 'You suck,'" said Whittier. "I don't see why other people care so much about what we choose to do. It's our life. If we choose not to drink or do drugs, why is it everyone else's problem that we do that?"
Most straightedge students said they felt like outcasts from society, and they have no regrets about that. But the perceived rift between themselves and other students means many straightedgers have different social activities than their peers.
"Being straightedge really improves your Nintendo scores." Applehanz ioked.
Straightedge parties usually involve live bands, dancing and moshing, and lots of caffeinated beverages. The eight-bit Nintendo has also become popular with the KU crowd.
In Lawrence, Macon said he enjoys skateboarding, bowling, going to concerts especially shows with straightedge bands such as CIV, Every Day Life or Youth Of Today—and hanging out.
"Whatever to keep myself busy," he said. "My idea of fun isn't always social. I find fulfillment in doing whatever I want."
As a freshman, Carlson went through fraternity rush, but didn't like what he found.
"I went through hazing, which was fun, but then I realized it was a drinking club, and I was like, 'Oh, this is boring,' so I got out of it," he said.
Despite their opposing viewpoints, straightedgers can have fun with the drinking crowd.
"Rolling drunks is a pastime I've found," Carlson said of literally rolling drunk people across floors or down hills. "They get drunk. They're sitting there on the ground. You just start rolling them. It's really fun. It's just a sadistic little pleasure, but they seem to like it. It helps if they're stoned, too."
Although most straightedge students say they face adversity, they compare their lifestyle to being in an exclusive, worldwide fraternity and sorority, and they admit no shame for the choices they make.
"Iam straightedge," Macon said, "and I'll be proud of it until death."
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